On Wednesday night, WHPR invited a load of bloggers over to theirs for beer and pizza to preview the new Budweiser commercial. Written by Dave Henderson and Richard Denney, and shot by award winning director Chris Palmer, it was shot over 5 days from an actual train on the metro-rail as it tracked around the city of Chicago. To be honest, I wouldn’t have known who Chris Palmer was before but it turns out he directed the Skoda cake ad and the one with the famous ex-footballers on the pub team (love that ad). 🙂
We sat down, got comfortable and watched the ad through a few times trying to spot all of the lyrical references. The ad uses a version of the Beatle’s ‘All Together Now’ which was done by The Hours using things like fire extinguishers. Long time readers will know that I’m a big fan of that particular band. [subliminal]Buy their albums immediately.[/subliminal]
It is genuinely a really impressive piece of filmmaking and must have been a bitch to do. There was a concensus in the room however that the ad reminded us of the mobile phone “coming together” concept and that is true to an extent. It doesn’t take away from what’s been done here though and it was brilliant to chat with the lads via Skype cam from London. The ad premieres tomorrow on Sky Digital so get your green buttons at the ready.
The web site which partners the ad is alltogethernow.ie which seems to be live ahead of the ad premiere. It’ll allow people to submit their own versions of particular sections of the ad which could then be edited into an internet/tv user generated version.